RWANDA: Radio official pleads not guilty to genocide

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

ARUSHA, 30 Sep 2005 (IRIN) - A former senior radio official in Rwanda pleaded not guilty on Friday before the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda to charges of inciting hatred, which led to killing of some 937,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus during the 1994 genocide.

Joseph Serugendo, 52, was the technical chief of Radio Television Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM) and a member of the national committee of a Hutu militia, known as the Interahamwe, which has been largely blamed for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people.

Serugendo was arrested in September in Libreville, the capital of Gabon.

The presiding judge, Khalida Khan, read the five-count indictment against Serugendo. It included the allegation that he established, funded and operated RTLM to disseminate anti-Tutsi messages.

In December 2003, the tribunal convicted two owners of RTLM and a newspaper editor on similar charges.

Trials are currently underway for 25 other people accused of crimes relating to the genocide. The tribunal has, so far, convicted 22 people and acquitted three.

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